ERIE, Pa. (WHTM) — Another court case over the opioid crisis and it has to do with a western Pennsylvania county.
Erie County is suing five Pharmacy chains that have distributed hundreds of millions of doses of the power prescription pain killers.
In its lawsuit, Erie county accused the companies of flooding the market with the pills and filling suspicious prescriptions between 2006 and 2014. The companies are CVS, Giant Eagle, Rite Aid, Walgreens, and Walmart.
“These national pharmacies, whether it’s under a statute or under their own policies, have an obligation to look for red flags to make sure that the opioids going out into the market are not going to the wrong parties and not being used for diverting for illegal purchases. We believe that in some cases that duty was breached,” Erie County solicitor Willaim Speros.
A similar lawsuit was filed in Ohio, which led to a $650 million dollar reward.